The U.S. Capitol is seen under dark clouds in Washington as the deadline approached for Congress to break an impasse over funding the government. / J. Scott Applewhite/Associated Press

Written by

Donovan Slack

Gannett Washington bureau

President Barack Obama speaks about the the budget and the partial government shutdown, Tuesday, Oct. 8, 2013, in the Brady Press Room of the White House in Washington. The president said he told House Speaker John Boehner he's willing to negotiate with Republicans on their priorities, but not under the threat of 'economic chaos.' (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak) / AP

Speaker of the House Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, speaks during a news conference on the ongoing budget battle outside his Capitol Hill office Tuesday. / Evan Vucci/Associated Press

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WASHINGTON — The federal government may be shut down. The nation may be heading toward defaulting on debt for the first time in history. But so far, neither side is blinking.

Among members of Wisconsin’s congressional delegation, stances have only hardened in the past week. Republicans are sticking to their demands that bills to reopen the entire government and avert debt default include governmental reforms. Democrats want the bills passed “clean” without any attachments.

“The political game that has been played by congressional Republicans has shut down the government and their continued threats of government default are threatening our economic recovery,” said Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis.

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., said there’s no way he’s going to “totally capitulate to their demands.”

“We’ve got to have one massive spending bill that does this and this, and oh, by the way, [we] don’t even want to debate the fact that we’re going to increase the debt burden on our children and grandchildren,” he said. “That, to me, is the unreasonable position.”

Republicans in the House echoed similar sentiments and lashed out at President Barack Obama. Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan accused him of giving Congress “the silent treatment,” Rep. Sean Duffy criticized him for failing to lead and Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner compared Obama’s tactics to “playing Russian roulette with the American economy.”

Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew has warned that the country will not have enough money to pay all of its bills starting next Thursday. In a letter to Congress, he said the treasury will have only $30 billion but the country’s bills can amount to as high as $60 billion per day. That means the country needs to borrow money.

But the United States has already reached its legal borrowing limit of $16.7 trillion and so needs Congress to increase that limit.

If it doesn’t, Treasury officials say the results would be “catastrophic,” rattling markets in the United States and around the world, sending interest rates soaring and possibly sending the economy into an even deeper recession than in 2008. The last time the country even came close to defaulting, in August 2011, the nation suffered a downgrade of its debt and the stock market plummeted.

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A bipartisan group of about 40 House members, including Wisconsin Republican Rep. Reid Ribble of Sherwood and Democratic Rep. Ron Kind of LaCrosse, say they have been trying to come up with ideas to resolve the situation but so far, none is sticking.

Ribble says he wants to focus less on advocating for changes to Obamacare — the sticking point that started the shutdown Oct. 1 — and more on extracting concessions on spending cuts and an overhaul of other entitlement programs, such as Social Security.

“We have to have this debate and conversation, because if we don’t, we’re going to be up against another debt limit, and then another debt limit, and then another debt limit,” he said.

He, Duffy, and Rep. Tom Petri of Fond du Lac are to appear at a bipartisan No Labels rally today calling for something to be done, although the group hasn’t agreed on what exactly should be done.

Duffy wouldn’t say in an interview if he will relent on his demand that changes to Obamacare be included in a government funding bill, but he said he is open to negotiation.

“I want to find a resolution,” he said. “I think we have to put everything on the table and have a good conversation.”

For Petri, who has been in Congress since 1979, the standoff is rather like government as usual.

In fact, while the rest of the Badger State delegation has canceled fundraisers during the government shutdown, he went forward with his annual, $250-a-head Wisconsin beer-tasting event Tuesday in Washington.

He said the party was a long time in the planning and he drove from Fond du Lac to Washington after the August recess with the trunk of his 2000 Chevy Malibu stuffed with beer, from New Glarus Spotted Cow and Stevens Point Drop Dead Blonde to Capital Brewery Pale Ale.

Petri said the last standoff that forced a government shutdown, which stretched 21 days in the mid-1990s and also included threats of not raising the debt limit without conditions, eventually produced a balanced budget agreement.

“It actually was a happy outcome of a rather painful period,” he said. “So that’s something that’s encouraging. In a sense.”